Helen
by Smiju
Summary: A one-shot Rorschach fic inspired after watching the movie in '09. It's obvious I don't know the material very well, but hopefully it's still enjoyable to read.  Kind of Rorschach/OC, but not really...


He had saved her before, just after that incident with the child-killing sicko, the one that had changed him in to what he was now. He'd saved her from a rapist... But she didn't run away screaming, like everyone else he saved tended to do. She waited, and even thought to put her clothes back on... at least the ones that the bastard hadn't ripped to shreds on her. She watched her attacker die with pity on her face... Pity... and she crossed herself, sending a prayer up for that loser's soul.  
The cops were coming, and he'd had to get out of there. He had walked over to her and. though she was rightfully frightened, her eyes never left his face.  
"You should get out of here," he'd stated gruffly.  
She'd looked stunned. "You're leaving?"  
He'd glanced back at the dead man's body, a smirk hidden behind his mask. "I'm not welcome here."  
"But... you saved me."  
"It won't make a difference to them." He indicated the approaching red and blue lights and then walked past her in to an alley. He climbed deftly to the top of a building, and she must have watched the whole time, because when he turned back for one last look, she was still staring up after him.  
Then the police snatched her up, loaded her on to an ambulance, and she was gone. But, no matter what he had done over the next few days, she always popped back in to his mind. He wondered why he hadn't been approached about the murder he had committed that night. He committed more and more, each ending up on the television or in the newspaper... but never her story.  
It didn't take him long to connect to the police files that one night, and look over her report. According to that file, according to that woman, he, Rorschach, was not even at that crime scene. According to her, she had killed her attacker in self defense...

He had sought her out after that, the whole time remembering the saying 'curiosity killed the cat.' It was a bad idea, and he knew it, but something had made that woman defend him.  
According to the police records, she was Helen Sanders, twenty-seven years old, 5' 1", 130 lbs, Dark brown hair, green eyes. On his own time, he had tracked her and found out just about everything there was to know about her. She was head clerk at Yordi's Grocery. She took all of the day-old food from the store home to the apartment complex that she owned, three blocks away. Most of those apartments she rented out at ridiculously low prices to elderly and handicapped couples, with whom she also shared her free food. After dinner she walked four blocks farther to St. Joan's Catholic Church, where she taught Sunday School on the weekends, to pray and confess. Confess what, he could never guess. The woman was the purest human being he had ever encountered. Every time someone needed help with a bag of groceries, every time one of her tenants had a problem, every time one of her young students needed someone to talk to, she dropped everything to help them.  
Eventually he did stop stalking her... at least during the day... he needed sleep after all, not much, but some. Still, he always seemed to swing by her apartments at some point during his waking hours. Sometimes she was settling in with a book from her extensive library, a glass of wine by her side. Sometimes she was sitting at the counter eating breakfast in her work clothes. What bothered him the most was that he was wasting his time watching her, instead of finding some bunch of scum to clean off the face of the earth. He almost wanted to catch her doing something wrong.

One night, he arrived early. She hadn't gotten home from church yet. He hid himself in a place where he could watch her approach, and he waited for her. So he was in the perfect spot to see her hurrying down the street those few minutes later. He also saw the group of would-be thugs trying to approach her. Without a thought, he had rushed to her aid (again). They had her backed against a wall by the time he got there, but he nonchalantly stepped up behind their backs.  
"Let her go," he'd growled to them.  
They started to laugh at him, but he quickly grabbed hold of one of them and brought him down. Another followed, and a third as well, before the rest backed off a little. He grabbed Helen's arm and pulled her away from the wall, placing himself between her and the ruffians. "Get out of here."  
She obeyed, running for home. Her attackers complained, and tried to goad on her protector. But he waited for them to come to him... because he knew they would. And he won, like he always did. But they got him good, good enough that he should have gone to the hospital... but he couldn't. And so, like a fool, he ran after her. Because she would help him without asking questions.

The knock on the door elicited no obvious response from inside the apartment, not at first anyway. She must have spotted him through the peep hole, but instead of opening the door right away she spoke through it. "You should be at the hospital."  
"They'd turn me in."  
This time her response was immediate, the locks all clanked open and she swung the door wide to let him in. She saw the blood trying to drip off his arm, and urgently pointed him toward the kitchen. He nodded and headed that way. By the time he stepped on to the linoleum floor he let go of the bleeding arm and tore off his jacket and rolled his shirt sleeve up to his shoulder.  
"What do you need?"  
He snatched a knife out of the dish drainer, and then barked out, "turn on the stove."  
She twisted the knob and the flames shot up as high as they could. She backed out of his way, but realized as he set the knife blade over the fire exactly what he was planning. "Are you sure about this?"  
"Positive," He poked at the wound again, cringing with each touch. Helen kicked a stool over to him, and he leaned his backside against it, but never really sat. Then he snatched up the knife and pressed it to the wound before instinct made him drop the hot utensil. He screamed out during the cauterization, and nearly passed out. After the knife clattered to the floor he tried to steady himself against the counter, but ended up merely slowing his slide to the floor. That was when his mind went black...

The first thing he did when he woke up was check to see if his mask was still on. It was, but his scarf and hat were not. Looking up he spied them on the counter, neatly placed on top of his folded jacket. Beside them were a glass of water, and a prescription bottle. With a little bit of difficulty he managed to find his feet and check the bottle's label. Vicodin. It was in the name of some other man, probably one of Helen's tenants. It was open, revealing two pills. She must have realized he couldn't open it with one arm. Speaking of arms... He looked to his side. The wound throbbed and burned, but the sleeve had been pulled down, and he could feel gauze and ointment against the skin beneath it.  
Lifting his mask just far enough, he popped one of the pills into his mouth and took a swig from the glass to wash it down. It was as he turned to put the glass in the sink that he saw her asleep in her chair. He'd seen her sleep there many times, but now she had no book, no glass of wine. She hadn't even bothered to pull the blanket over herself.  
Suddenly the door buzzer sounded. Helen jolted awake, and as the buzzer sounded again, looked over at her guest before rushing to the door. "What is it?"  
"Miss Sanders, there's a couple police men down here, and they've riled up Mr. Johns pretty good. I think you should come down here."  
"Give me two minutes..." She turned, and glanced about the apartment for a moment, not really sure where to start. Finally she (ran) over to the coffee table and pulled a key from a hidden compartment.  
He had already put on his hat, and, though painfully slowly, pulled his jacket up. As he reached for the scarf, the woman handed him the key.  
"You can't go far with that arm yet," she tried to convince him. "There's a metal door downstairs with a heavy duty lock. This is the only key. If you don't want to run, take the elevator to the basement and lock yourself in there. You'll be able to get out, but no one else will be able to get in. Not even me."

"Why are you doing this?"

"For the same reason that I lied to them the last time. I won't let them punish you for saving me." The buzzer went off again, but Helen didn't budge. "Take the key."

He snatched it from her hands simply so that she would leave, and she did. She went down to keep the cops off of his trail. But he couldn't help thinking she was right. His arm would impair him during his escape, and so would the Vicodin. He should listen to her, and use the basement. It was stupid, but he did it.

Despite the constant and very loud humming of all the wires and things in the well locked room, he could hear when Helen brought the cops down in to the basement. "I'm telling you officers, if no one saw anyone come in, then no one came in. We're a very close knit building, like a family. We know everything that happens to everyone. We know all the visitors to each apartment, and strangers are pointed out quickly. There would be rumors already."

The cops puttered around the basement, looking for hiding places. There was nothing, except the big red door.

"What's in there?"

"All the electrical stuff for the building. I'd show you, but the key is hidden away upstairs... I keep it well locked because we have a lot of sleepwalkers and such in the building. If they somehow managed to get down here, I wouldn't want them to get in there... they'd die for sure."

The cops couldn't argue with her, but they continued to search. "Gentlemen, if you don't mind, I kind of need to get going. I took the day off of work in order to get some projects done around here, and I've only just woken up. You see, these are my clothes from yesterday..."  
She had them convinced, and she got them out of the basement. Ten minutes later the elevator announced its arrival in the basement once more. Immediately there was a pounding on his door. "If you're in there, it's safe."

"I doubt that," he said, but opened the door anyway.

"How's your arm?"

"Almost numb, thanks to that pill."

"I'm glad it helped."

"It helped the pain, but made me useless."

"It's probably messing with your head because you took it on an empty stomach. When's the last time you ate something."

"I need to go."

"I wouldn't. It's safe in here, but they're still watching the street. Somehow they know it was you that took down those guys last night." He ignored her words and pressed the button to open the elevator door. She followed him. "Look, at least stay and eat something. If you pass out on the street they'll find you for sure, and..." The elevator opened and they both stepped in. But as the door closed his stomach growled.

Trying to act (cool), he asked plainly, "What did you have in mind?"

"I already put some leftovers in the oven. A ziti, and a veggie casserole."

He looked down at her, and even though he had no visible facial expression, and though she wasn't looking at him, she blushed in embarrassment and tried very hard to keep a straight face. "Hey, you're not the only one who didn't have dinner last night."

Though he wasn't used to actual major, sit-down style dinners, he appreciated it. After they finished off the reheated food she offered him the spare bedroom for a place to rest his head. "There's only a ridiculously uncomfortable futon in there, but it's better than nothing..." As he went to look in to the room she tossed him a small box. He checked inside and found everything he needed to re-wrap his wounded arm.

"Thanks." He closed the door and locked it, not because he didn't trust her, but simply out of habit. The shades were already closed tight, but he had to check. Then he took off his jacket, (the scarf was tucked in the pocket), his hat, and finally his shirt. Best to leave the gloves on, he thought. No fingerprints that way.

The first bandage stuck to his skin, and it killed to pull it off. It pulled the 'scab' enough to make it bleed, but not nearly as badly as it had the night before. She'd done a good job. The wrapping was smooth and tight, and whatever ointment she had put on it seemed to be helping. There was some pus, but nothing infected looking. He'd have to keep an eye on it. Keep changing the bandage and washing it out.

The bandage that he put on wasn't nearly as pretty looking as the one Helen had done, but it did its job. After that, he decided it might be safe to relax and let the Vicodin and heavy meal run their course. He lay back on the futon without bothering to pull it out flat, and he slept.

It was completely dark in the room when he woke up. The Vicodin was wearing off, and his arm was throbbing again. He slowly dressed himself again, unlocked the door as quietly as he could, and crept out to the kitchen. The prescription bottle was still there, with its single pill. He dumped the pill in his mouth and choked it down without a drink.

Helen was in the living room again, only on the couch this time. She had changed into a pair of white pajamas, and the pale yellow pillow behind her head helped to complete the look of an angel. But angels don't sleep... and they're not mortal. An angel wouldn't need to be saved by someone like him.

Though he should have snuck out the door and made that the end of it, he crossed the room and knelt down by the couch. His gloved hand reached out for her cheek. He had seen the bruise at the beginning of the day but said nothing. He didn't know which one of those thugs had hit her, but they were all dead now, so it didn't matter. She flinched a little at his touch, but then awoke suddenly and sat up.

"Rorschach?"

He was a little shocked that she knew his name, but then he remembered how often he'd been in the news lately.

"You're leaving..."

He nodded. "Thank you for this." He reached out to touch her face again. She looked so sad, and so afraid for him. "Stop walking these streets alone." His warning made her blush and chuckle.

"What you're trying to tell me is I'm never going to see you again, right?"

"Not if you're lucky."

"Obviously I'm not," she stated facetiously, "or you wouldn't have had to save me twice."

"That has to stop."

She faded in to seriousness. "I know. Thank you. I'm not sure I deserved it."

"If anyone in the god-forsaken world deserves to be saved, it's you. I've never seen a better person. You're the closest thing to an angel in this place."

She shrugged bashfully. "I was always told 'we're only as good as our actions prove us to be.'"

"All the more reason for you to stay away from me. I won't let you be my guardian angel, I have too much bad left to do." When she didn't reply, he stood up, but left his hand on her face a moment longer as he leaned forward to kiss her forehead. There was not skin contact of course, his mask prevented that, but she knew his intention and her hand rose to his face. He pulled her away. "You'd only get hurt."

She looked away, but let her hands stay in his. "You should get out of here, before anyone else wakes up."

"Goodbye Helen," was his only reply before retreating out in to the hallway, and closing the door between them


End file.
